Not only did the Tau get 7 (!) erratas to their codex they also got a full 10 pages of FAQs answered. Is this a step in the right direction for GW? Maybe we will start to see more erratas as the FAQs get released.

About Petey Pab

Aspiring 40k analyst, tournament reporter and Ultramarines enthusiast, Petey Pab only seeks to gather more knowledge about the game of 40k and share it with as many people as he can in order to unite both hobbyists and gamers. We are, after all, two sides of the same coin.

109 Responses to “Breaking News! Tau FAQ”

Most of these make a lot of sense. I think the coordinated firepower errata was what most people thought the rule was meant to be despite those that argued “it makes your buffmander gives buffs to units all the way across the battlefield.”

Can’t say I’ve ever tried to tank shock a Stormsurge pesonally, but man would that suck to have it straight up die.

Yes. We will have to change a few though to reflect GW. I actually agree with almost every ruling in the Tau FAQ, the only one I don’t agree with is Stormsurges with anchors down dying to a Tank Shock, haha.

Yeah… that doesn’t make much sense to me. A giant, anchored super-heavy just gets insta-killed if any size tank tries to move through it? I guess I get the RAW perspective that anything that can’t move out of the way of a tank shock usually dies, but you’d think they would have written an exception into the Stormsurge’s anchor rule so that wouldn’t happen.

Per the BRB, you can tank shock anyone. The only restriction is that if a super heavy does a thunderblitz attack, it is treated as a simple ram/tank shock when done to another GMC or another superheavy. But there’s nothing in the BRB preventing any vehicle that can normally tank shock from doing it to a super heavy.

Actually I don’t think its that bad, if your going fully nova shot then most likely a target that your 2nd weapons wont be of much use against, or out of range of them… The bigger issue will be if Reroll 1s won’t help with overheating blast weapons in the final draft.

I think this was a really good FAQ. They cleared up a lot of things, and even the stormsurge ruling, though not agreeable to some, is a clarification which in the grand scheme of things is all we really wanted.

Hey Reece, I just realized in the ITC you can not tank shock a SH/GC unless you are also a Superheavy. So even if this rule were used in conjunction with the ITC FAQ you can not kill a stormsurge with a rhino. Huzzah!

In the FAQ there is also a provision for Tank Shocking a Stormsurge without being a Super Heavy.

It is one of several inconsistencies and poorly worded items I’ve been trying to get addressed for some time.

The Biggest one is that Super Heavy Walkers and Skimmers can go to upper levels, but Gargantuan creatures can’t, so you can make a Stompa immune from a Charging Wraith Knight if you deploy it on the 2nd floor.

ITC FAQ. GW doesn’t have any tank shock restrictions. If you can tank shock, you can tank shock anyone. ITC FAQ restricts it so you can only tankshock a SH if you are also a SH. So that at least alleviates some of the issues for Stormsurges when using ITC rules. No little rhino or trukk is going to tank shock you off the map.

GCs/FGCs cannot be tank shocked by a model that isn’t a super-heavy vehicle or GC/FGC itself. Stop any other type of model making a tank shock move 1” away from the GC/FGC.

Same FAQ page 15:
If a Stormsurge that has deployed its Stabilising Anchors is Tank Shocked, it must Death or Glory in response. If it fails to stop the Tank Shocking vehicle, it suffers D3 wounds and the tank is left in base to base contact with the Stormsurge at the point it made contact with it.

I don’t think they were worried about baneblades when they wrote the 2nd one. I remember when they talked about it on the podcast, and Reece specifically mentioned Rhinos.

The thing with super-heavies and levels is Page #8:
For ease of tournament play, at this event, Gargantuan Creatures, Super-heavy Vehicles, and other Vehicles that do not have the Walker or Skimmer type may not move/be deployed onto an upper level of a ruin.

Since a Stompa or an IK is a Walker they can go to upper levels. An Obelisk is a skimmer so same deal. But my Barbed Heirodule can’t climb, nor can a Wraithknight or Stormsurge.

I’ve adopted the Super-Heavies and levels thing as a pet. Until that one gets fixed I include it in basically every poll, and every rules question I submit. I brought it up before, during, and after LVO 2015. My partner and I lost the finals of the team tourney at wargamescon 2015 because of it. I make a point of every game that I play where I’m running a Stompa and my opponent has a GC to let them know I think the wording on that FAQ item is a mistake, and they can go up levels. At my GT 66.7% of people said fix it so that GC can go up. 26.6% said fix it so that SHW and SHS can’t go to upper levels, and only 6.7% said they think the wording is correct.

Even a Pulse Blastcannon has a significant chance of failing to stop an undamaged Rhino in a DoG Attack. If it’s got the Pulse Driver Cannon, it’s less than 50/50. Even worse if it’s got Extra Armour for whatever reason.

I’m not sure how I liked the two FAQs right next to each other.
Putting them together makes the logic something like
“Treat supporting units as if they’re being charged for all purposes including line of sight except for when banshee mask charges them then they’re not the counted as the unit being charged”

I think the wording is wonky which is kind of confusing but the overall ruling makes sense. The unit being charged can’t overwatch if its within 6″ of a dirge caster, if it’s gone to ground, if the unit has a banshee mask, etc. But none of that should stop a perfectly healthy unit next to them from lending their firepower.

Of course if that second unit was within range of the dirge caster or went to ground (etc) then they wouldn’t be able to fire other.

Yeah, now that I look at the Banshee’s Mask rule again that one is pretty iffy. I don’t play Tau so any encounters with me getting charged by Banshees don’t involve supporting fire. The exact wording of the masks is just that nothing can overwatch them. Thematically I could go either way about still being able to use Supporting Fire or not, but definitely RAW it doesn’t make much sense to be able to use it.

Yes and no. It allows your buddies to shoot overwatch even though usually only the unit being charged can shoot overwatch. But the “helper” units still need to follow all the normal overwatch restrictions (ie – in range, in LoS, can’t be gone to ground, can’t have already fired overwatch once, etc). In the case of Banshees, it’s not that the units using the Supporting Fire have any reason they can’t fire overwatch, it’s just that the unit they are shooting at (Banshees) can never be Overwatched. It’s kind of a tough one to call.

Glad to see that, I think this is a good compromise. Going on and off every turn was way too absurd. But the whole point of the formation was to come back in full strength and throw expendable units at the opponent, so the spirit of this formation is being retained.

No it doesn’t it says they can enter reserves every turn
This is NOT the same thing as they can enter and leave reserves the same turn.
Unless you plan on adding a bunch of words to the faq it doesn’t say.

“Q: Does the Rearm and Refuel rule [snipped] allow the unit to enter ongoing reserves every turn (as long as it is near the table edge as specified)?

A: Yes”

Seems pretty darn cut and dry to me. No adding words necessary. Specific trumps general, so while generally units cannot come in from reserves and then leave the board again the same turn, specifically the firestream can.

It doesn’t say anywhere specifically they can enter and leave reserves the same turn. It only says they can enter reserves every turn. There is no problem with that statement it’s completely true however that still doesn’t give piranhas permission to enter and leave reserves the same turn. There is a direct faq stating you can’t do this and nothing in this faq contradicts that.

Every means what it always meant before piranha faq came out. The piranha can enter reserves every turn. However this is still not permission to break any rule in 40k. 40k is a permissive ruleset just because this faq doesn’t say you cant go into reserves thd same turn as you leave doesn’t mean you can.
And nearly every other rule like this that provides an exception to breaking a brb rule specifically tells you when you can override a rule. This one doesn’t.
So making statements like it doesn’t say I can’t do it has never worked before.

Actually many such rules don’t contain any such mention- for example, Drop Pods don’t actually have the ability to Deep Strike even though they are required to do so.

There is such a thing as implicit permission, however, which I would argue is in effect here; since the faq said they can do something, it is implied by that allowance to be able to violate a normal rule that would prevent them from doing so.

Drop pods are not required to deepstrike they ate given express permission in the rule of drop pod assault.
This is nothing like the above example because drop pods do have a special rule that says it must deepstrike.

This is more like people claiming they can assault after deepstriking even when the rule for that unit doesn’t give it express permission. Which comes up all the freakin time because people are trying to manipulate the riules to say something it never stated.

>Drop pods are not required to deepstrike they ate given express permission in the rule of drop pod assault.

Yes they are, and no they aren’t. They do not possess the Deep Strike rule nor does the Drop Pod Assault rule grant it to them, though it says they must start the game in Deep Strike reserve.

The difference between this and other “doesn’t say I can’t so I can” is that the permission is implicit as part of the rule. Saying that they can do something “every turn” ONLY has any meaning if they are allowed to violate the rule that would normally prevent them from doing something every turn.

It’s not implicit because it doesn’t say it.
Example
A mawloc can mishap and enter ongoing reserves EVERY turn
However it still doesn’t have permission to enter and leave reserves the same turn.
The problem is people are taking one action and implying they can take two actions from that statement which doesn’t confer both actions.
I realize that’s what you want it to do but it still doesn’t allow it. No matter how much you keep trying to say GW is inferring it they don’t say you can.
Just like assault from ongoing reserves
The formation must say it for you to assault from reserves.

I’m not a fan of letting Stormsurges get insta-killed, but I do think it is a bit different than the situation they were alluding to in the BRB FAQ. In that situation they’re referring to a GMC that can move but must move in a slightly “non-textbook” manner to get out of the way. They don’t want you to cheese an opponent to death by saying “oh you moved but you had to take the long way around which is illegal.” It’s slightly different when the model isn’t allowed to move period.

Of course if this ruling stands no one will drop anchors near a Rhino or something. The point is, the SS should be allowed to death or glory or take d3 wounds. Simply removing them is an absurd ruling that doesnt make sense.

I’m with the above comments here. If you have a Rhino in 12 and anchor the thing you just had it coming. Superheavies are already way better than normal tanks but those aren’t supposed to be made of cardboard.

Exactly this. Also not every tank that shocks is a Rhino. That’s just used right now to make it the most ridiculous scene possible. If we argue fluffwise I can bloody well see a Landraider run it over.

You really don’t even need to worry about a rhino or any av12 or less tank using tank shock against a Stormsurge.
It’s almost impossible for an av12 or less tank to survive a death or glory attack without getting at least getting crew stunned and thus stopping the vehicle.

First the Stormsurge automatically hits the front armour per death or glory with no cover save allowed.
Using a str10 ap1 smash or str d atk, the rhino is automatically glanced on a 1 and you reroll that 1 for a pen result instead. Now you roll on the pen chart with +2 to the table to get a stun or better result and stop the tank shock.
It’s nearly impossible for a rhino to kill a Stormsurge this way.

I’m sorry I forgot to add that the pulse drive cannon means your atk is str d ap1 which also means you roll can roll d3 hull or 3 with a 6 via ITC rules and can just outright blow up the rhino as well. As well as stopping it via a stun result on the pen table.

Reliably I would say the only tanks with a chance to kill a Stormsurge via tank shock need to be av13 or more.

Pulse driver is str d ap1
So not only is the there a chance to stun, immobilise or explode 4 out of 6.
But you also have a chance to outright kill the rhino with either a 6 result in the str d table or a 3 result on the d3 hull roll.

While everyone is worried about rhinos breaking their stormsurges ankles, I’m over here enjoying confirmations on multiple holophotons, firestream piranhas actually coming back full strength, the eight not being allowed to cheat the sig system numbers, multitrackers definitely work on interceptor and overwatch, farsight riptides getting access to the ECPA again, markerlights being unaffected by void shields, coordinated firepower clarifications, and Sun sharks getting their starting pulse bomb.

I find it interesting there was no clarification on whether a single model could take signature systems or they count the same as relics.

People just don’t like to read. They see the BRB FAQ that says “only one relic per model unless the rule explicitly says multiple are allowed.” And they conveniently forget to check if the couple words apply to the Tau codex.